


okay, cards on the table - I may have lied

by kwritten



Series: supernatural boredom results in like quests and stuff [4]
Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Revolution (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fae, Buffyverse - Freeform, F/M, Fae & Fairies, Gen, Keyverse, Quests
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-14
Updated: 2015-10-19
Packaged: 2018-04-26 08:43:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4998235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kwritten/pseuds/kwritten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The problem, Dawn thought moodily, staring down at her empty desk, was that midterms just so happened to coincide with a full moon, an apocalypse in Cambodia, and a vampire hierarchy shift on campus. In between administering and grading midterms, dealing with sobbing students in the hallways, doing research for Giles, organizing lockdown for the local group of werewolves, and going head-to-head with a pimply vampire minion with delusions of grandeur, Dawn had forgotten what a normal week was supposed to be like; now, in the aftermath, she was just… not expecting a fae princess with a warrior in tow looking for a mystical Key, but it couldn't hurt to help them out. </p><p>Could it?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. there are rules about this sort of thing

**Author's Note:**

> for the prompt #61: a famous warrior is counselled by a leader of the fae  
> Priscilla/Charlie/Bass
> 
> part of the "sure? let's go on a quest" universe. this is the interlude between chapters 2 & 3\.   
> I separated this section out into a different story with it's own chapters to that (a) Buffy fans wouldn't feel confused by entire sections without Dawn and (b) Revolution-only fans could avoid this section altogether if they wanted. "let's go on a quest" is a complete story without this section, but THIS is why I wrote any of this ridiculous story to begin with. I know it might seem weird to post/write it this way - since ch3 of "quest" already gives you the 'answer' that Charlie is seeking from the Between and seemingly the 'end' of the story - but oh well, this is how it worked out. 
> 
> fair warning for copious amounts of flirty Charloe and sassy!professor Dawn and ridiculous answers to canon fusions. this is mostly for the sake of fun and sheer silliness.

Dawn looked down at her desk and sighed, tapping her fingers on her leg erratically. After a moment, she turned her attention to her open office door, _willing_ a harried student to come crashing through, or an angry student, or a frustrated professor looking for fresh coffee and mistaking her office door for the staff room. Hell, at this point she’d take one of the Slayerettes with a disaster, or a demon looking for vengeance or revenge, anything to distract her from the complete _lack_ of anything better to do. She turned back to her empty desk mournfully. 

“This is _your_ fault,” she scolded the lines of wood, tracing her finger down an old scar in the heavy finish. 

Probably she _could_ be working on her independent research, get published and make the university look good, speed up her tenure review. She _could_ open up one of the mysteriously-smelly packages from Giles and do her duty for the team, research-mode. She could plan out her syllabi for the following semester, or respond to one of the half-dozen emails in her inbox from the dean. 

She could challenge Spike to a game of _Words with Friends_ or return to her ongoing battle with Kennedy in _Draw Something_. Or break her _Candy Crush_ record for good. Maybe stalk Janice on facebook, last she’d checked the other woman was getting a divorce in Cuba. 

She could read that book that Willow had sent the previous week that was apparently _so amazing_. She could call Faith back about that tattoo that was popping up on corpses all over Savannah, because even though she had sent a comprehensive email on the topic earlier that morning, chances were Faith would still call in a few hours to get the debrief. 

She could go down to local headquarters and get some training time in with Amanda. Or crash one of the yoga classes on campus, since the entire Phys Ed department had been attempting to woo her into the gym since she arrived. Apparently something about the way she fell all over herself whenever anyone from any sports department was around endeared her to the entire department. She was either the subject of a bet or at the very least a rousing debate. 

Except she was supposed to stay in her office for at least the next twenty minutes on the off-chance that a student would pop through the door, breathless and anxious. Not that any of them did. Either she was a terrible instructor and they all were avoiding her presence, or she was so fabulous that none of them were struggling. Judging from the friendly smiles she got around campus (and off) the first wasn’t entirely correct and after the abysmal midterm grades the previous week, the second just couldn’t be true, either. Maybe students didn’t visit their instructors during office hours? Did she have bad timing? Did she seem unapproachable? Maybe she should put a candy bowl on the doorknob, entice undergraduates in with the promise of high fructose corn syrup and red dye #2. 

The problem, Dawn thought moodily, staring down at her empty desk, was that midterms just so happened to coincide with a full moon, an apocalypse in Cambodia, and a vampire hierarchy shift on campus. In between administering and grading midterms, dealing with sobbing students in the hallways, doing research for Giles, organizing lockdown for the local group of werewolves, and going head-to-head with a pimply vampire minion with delusions of grandeur, Dawn had forgotten what a normal week was supposed to be like; now, in the aftermath, she was just…

“Bored,” she sang the word softly under her breath, kicking one leg out to slowly turn her swivel chair around in a wide circle. “Bored, boooooored, boar-ed, bah-bah-bah booooo--- oops!”

In the time that she had spun in a full circle, someone had made them at home in the chair on the other side of the desk. After a moment’s pause some _thing_ felt like the more accurate word, which did nothing to diminish her embarrassment in the wake of her musical number. The girl was tan and muscular, almost Slayer-esque in the way she held her body in the chair, even slouching down in a mock-presentation of comfort and ease, her muscles were tense and aware. Long golden hair fell in a riot of waves down her back. There was something a bit pixie-ish about her nose and something wicked about the way her eyebrows cut clean dark lines above bright eyes. She was wearing a simple green shirt that hung a bit off-kilter and showed signs of dirt and wear and a dusty pair of jeans. It was the lack of ornamentation that caused the hair on the back of Dawn’s neck stand at attention. Demons liked their amulets and tattoos, vampires clung to the precious ornamentation of humanity as if a cheap necklace from a long-ago forgotten boyfriend was enough of a costume to keep them alive, witches typically didn’t look so wind-swept and wild. This girl… or whatever she was… looked like she rode the wind to and fro, ate out under the stars, and knew her way around a weapon or two.

She could have been a Slayer if it weren’t for the fact that she clearly was something completely _not_ a Slayer. 

Dawn cleared her throat, “How …can I help you?” She waited for a beat, hoping that the girl-shaped-creature across from her hadn’t guessed that _she_ had fully guessed that this wasn’t a meet and greet between a professor and a student with a question about their midterm grade. 

Not that any of them had, Dawn inwardly groused. It was almost like they didn’t care! And she could list at least five tests off the top of her head that she had graded far too harshly for no reason other than that she had been juggling a lot that week. 

The girl across from her raised her eyebrow, the slight movement cutting through Dawn’s internal monologue. 

“I’m sorry…?” Dawn raised her own eyebrows in response. “Did you have a question about a grade? I can’t remember you from class, so it might just be a problem of attendance. You can’t expect to pass if you never show up.”

“We both know that I’m not one of your students,” her voice was husky and amused, the corners of her lips gently sloping up into something more akin to a smirk than a smile. 

Dawn smiled in return, “Then why don’t you ask me what you came to ask?”

“What makes you think I have a question for you at all?” the tenseness in the girl’s shoulders relaxed the slightest fraction, confusing Dawn all the more. 

“I expect if you wanted me dead, I already would be.” It wasn’t a lie. 

The girl chuckled, low and soft, “You aren’t wrong.”

“ _You_ might be,” Dawn said ominously. Okay, she wasn’t exactly a match against anything that came along, but she held her own in a fight. Was getting better all the time. (Probably should train with Amanda more, come to think of it.)

“I’m looking for something. I’ve come a very long way. Rumor has it the sister of the Slayer is the protector of what I’m looking for.”

Dawn tried to ignore the tightening in her chest, “Sounds exciting.”

The girl shrugged, “Pretty boring, actually. Just looking for a Key.” A shadow passed over her face, “Just a little Key.”

Dawn shook her head. 

The girl frowned, leaned forward, “But you _are_ Dawn Summers. Sister of the Slayer of three lives?”

Dawn pointed to the placard on her desk _Dawn Summers, PhD_ , “Right place. Wrong quest, there’s no Key here.”

The girl slumped back in the chair with a huff, “Fucking _predictable_.”

Dawn blinked, surprised. 

A man, even more wild looking than the girl, stepped through the open door and closed it gently behind him. He had bright eyes and slightly curling hair and a pair of swords dangling from his belt. He looked a bit like a cast member from _The Walking Dead_ that had wandered off-set. Or some kind of a displaced Ren Faire reject, kicked out for loving the weapons more than the clothes. He nodded to Dawn in greeting and then hissed something to the girl under his breath, in something that definitely wasn’t a language Dawn knew. 

This was – actually – the strangest thing that had happened so far, in her mind, since she could place most spoken and dead human languages and understand a fair amount of the known demon dialects. 

Coming across someone looking for the Key that didn’t speak a language she knew intimately was about the strangest thing that _could_ happen. Even if no one seemed to be looking for the Key over the past few years (until now), Dawn had become the leading expert on the subject, digging up every text and rumor and ritual surrounding the lore of the Key’s beginnings and endings. According to her extensive research, there were only about ten demon cultures that had even the barest trace of a rumor surrounding the Key. All of the languages of which she was intimately familiar with. 

The girl turned to Dawn, “I’m sorry for interrupting your day, this has been a bit of a dead end. Which we weren’t entirely …” her voice trailed off. 

“What… I’m sorry. What do you need it for? And why did you think I had it?”

The girl stared at her shoes and spoke morosely, “I just need it for this quest… thing. My mother is missing and apparently this is how we get her back. But. Mommy dearest is the one that told me to look for the Key and she’s not really known for…”

“She’s a bitch,” the man spit out. He looked damn cheerful about it, too.

“Enough,” the girl said harshly, causing the man to take a step back. Dawn fingered the blade hidden in her sleeve absently. “She’s not always forthcoming. We thought it was a bit of a goose chase to be honest. I’m surprised you are actually a real person.” She smiled brightly at Dawn, who felt herself going a little pink in the ears. 

Dawn cleared her throat awkwardly, “So… your mom is missing and you need the Key to get her back? But you don’t know what this Key looks like or does?”

“The Key will get us to the Between and the Seer there will tell us how to rescue my mother.” The man snorted, but the girl ignored him. “Or that’s the theory, anyway.”

“And … how did you find _me_?”

“I’ve met your sister, the Slayer,” the man said, his voice gruff and a little bored. 

The girl nodded, as if that answered everything. 

“I still don’t…” Dawn shook her head.

The girl interrupted, “It doesn’t much matter, you don’t have the Key. Which is just as my uncle suspected. The Key is just a pretty story.”

“So…” Dawn pursed her lips and tried not to laugh. “You thought that you’d just walk into my office, ask for a mystical Key, and I’d just hand it over.”

The two warriors stared at her in silence. 

Dawn burst into laughter, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. It’s just…” she gasped for breath. “Why would I just hand it over to you?”

“You are a _scholar_ , are you not?” the girl asked, confused. 

“My sister is the Slayer. If it’s true that I am the guardian of this Key… whatever it is… did you expect me to be a pushover?”

“You could not best me in hand-to-hand combat,” the girl said, raising her chin slightly. 

“Probably not,” Dawn sobered a little. “But… this plan is a little ridiculous, don’t you think?”

The girl glanced at her companion and back to Dawn, “You are a scholar and yet you act as though you do not know who I am.”

The man folded his arms over his chest and smiled in a way that made Dawn feel very, very small. She probably shouldn’t have laughed at them. And then her mind buzzed to those half-dozen unopened emails, was there something from Andrew about all of this that she missed? Surely someone looking for the Key would warrant a _phone call_ from HQ and not just a mass email… right?

“Um…” Dawn stared at them owlishly, her voice very small, “Should I?”

“I,” the girl said, rising to her feet, “am Princess Charlotte of the Fae.”

“The Fae?”

“And this is my uncle’s General, Sebastian, the Scourge of ---“

“Now Charlie,” he interrupted. “No reason to start using pet names in front of a stranger.” Charlie grinned at him wickedly, but said nothing. The General turned to Dawn, “She has a great deal of pet names for me, and most are not suitable for innocent ears.”

“Back up,” Dawn gasped. She was so _not_ ready to untangle whatever surge of bizarre hormones had just been released in her office while she was still reeling from the previous information dump. “I _definitely_ would have remembered an email about Fae royalty. So … you say you’ve met my sister?”

The General nodded, “A few years back. She staked my brother, thought he was a vampire most like.”

“She staked Miles?” Charlie let out a peal of laughter. Dawn could have sworn that the lights flickered when she did so, but it also could be that she was developing an eye twitch. It was known to happen.

“So when you say you ‘met’ my sister, what you really mean is that you and your brother wandered into her territory, fought, and lost?” Dawn looked from one of her guests to the other. “And then expected her to just pass on the information that two scruffy guys in the woods were posing as vamps, but were actually fairies?”

“Well…” he shuffled back and forth. 

“Bass?!” Charlie looked caught between amusement and frustration. 

Dawn could relate.

Bass shrugged, “We heard a rumor that the new Slayer was… and so we came up to check her out.”

“You tried to seduce the Slayer?” Charlie flung herself back into the chair and rolled her eyes. 

“Damn fine warrior,” Bass mused. “Would have tried to bring her home but there are rules about that.”

Dawn rubbed her temples with her fingers, “Okay look. This whole performance is really interesting. And while I doubt that any lesser demon could keep up this level of a charade,” she waved her hand at Bass, “a _hellgod_ came looking for the Key once and we didn’t give it to her, so what makes you think I’m going to believe (a) that _you_ are a princess and (b) that you two are Fae. Especially when you seem to be relying on my sister remembering you from a few years ago, but admitted that she probably thought you were vamps?”

Charlie waved her hand and the potted plant in the corner grew five feet and then smiled charmingly at Dawn, who raised her eyebrows and shook her head. “Surely there are records of the Fae?” Charlie hedged.

“Even _if_ the Watcher’s Council was aware of the Fae, it would take a while for me to dig through the journals to figure anything out. And it still wouldn’t prove that you are who you say you are, unless,” she looked up at Bass, “Unless you ever successfully seduced a Slayer or a Watcher _and_ told them you were Fae?”

Bass shook his head, “Not in a few hundred years. Miles and I nearly started a war over one once and swore off the whole species. Also there are rules about this kind of thing.”

“That may have been important to bring up a while ago, Bass.”

“How was I supposed to know that the rules about Slayers were pertinent?” He held his arms out, “We can’t bring them home, and Miles almost did once so…” he winced. “I didn’t say that.”

Charlie turned to Dawn, “I just need to _borrow_ the Key, to get my mom. Can’t you just…?”

“Is not really something I can loan out like a library book, princess,” Dawn sighed. 

They sat for a while, the silence punctuated by Bass’ muttering under his breath, presumably about a long-ago love affair with a Slayer. Under any other circumstance, Dawn would have pushed more information about the war and the Slayer that nearly went back to Fae and where exactly _was_ Fae? Was it another realm? And why can’t Slayers go there? And who was this Miles character? Dawn chewed her lip and wondered if Bass and Miles were roaming the world seducing Slayers at the same time Spike was trying to kill them all, that would be a ridiculous turn of events – Bass batting his eyelashes at a Slayer while Spike waited outside with a knife. 

“Heaven help us,” she muttered under her breath. 

“Wait!” Charlie scooted forward in her chair, leaning over the desk. “ _You_ are the guardian. Come with us to the Between! Guard the Key and return it safely at the end of our journey. You are not a Slayer, so there are no rules about coming with us.” She paused, “I’ve taken a lot of humans into the Fae realm. I promise to return you.”

A muscle in Bass’ cheek twitched. 

Dawn looked from one to the other, and then to her empty desk. She was going to get in _so much trouble_ for this. “I have an idea!” She sprang out of her chair and ran to the side table by the tiny window that looked out on the quad, rummaging through the scraps of parchment there. After a moment she held up a particularly ancient looking sheet covered in strange lettering, “A contract!”

“A contract!” Charlie’s voice echoed Dawn’s enthusiasm. 

“A _magickal_ contract,” Dawn amended, lying it carefully on her empty desk and grinning. “We sign this in blood and it binds us to each other. Neither one of us can harm the other until we return to this spot.”

Charlie nodded emphatically, “A spectacular plan!”

“Oh yes,” Bass intoned from the doorway. “Nothing can go wrong with this.”

Dawn edited a few passages with her pen and then held out a needle for Charlie to prick her finger, “Just draw an ‘X’ right here,” she pointed to the bottom of the page. 

Charlie did so, smiling widely. 

Dawn pricked her finger and stared at the drop of blood for a moment. For all she knew, she was a dead Key, no power left, drained by Glory and her goons, an empty vessel. Except when a Fae Princess comes looking for you, telling you that you have purpose again, that you are needed, it’s a heady sort of rush and Dawn wasn’t ready to let go of it yet. 

She scratched her ‘X’ directly on top of Charlie’s, bonding them together. 

The two girls drew in a deep breath and smiled at each other.

And then a rush of green energy knocked them both off their feet. 

Dawn popped her head over the top of the desk and grimaced sheepishly, “Okay so… I may have neglected to mention that … _I’m_ the Key.”

Charlie stared at her open-mouthed. 

In the corner of the room, Bass grunted, “Yup. Nothing wrong with this plan. Nothing at all.”


	2. we definitely know what we are doing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dawn is pretty sure they've been walking in circles and she's tired of it

Dawn stumbled over an exposed root and swore under her breath. Up ahead, Bass snorted and not for the first time, she silently cursed Fae super-hearing. Why was she always around people who could hear and see and smell better than her? Couldn’t this whole Key thing have come with a few perks?

A pixie landed on her shoulder and began chattering in her ear angrily. Probably she stepped on someone’s home again. She was human, essentially, and didn’t have the instincts that Charlie and Bass did as they picked their way through the forest, preventing them from squishing a single flower or bed of moss unintentionally. Which mostly meant that this wasn’t the first pixie to come flying out of a tree or brook or hollow to chew her out, much to her eternal annoyance and Bass’ continued amusement. 

For a deadly General, he had the sense of humor of a twelve year old boy. She was half-surprised he hadn’t tried to pass off a fart joke or two. She sensed that she had Charlie to thank for that little nugget of reprieve. 

Or herself. 

They had been trudging along through human and Fae terrain for the better part of four days and Charlie was standing firm on her policy of silent treatment. The princess didn’t even seem prone to casual chatter with her General. Dawn had caught the two of them murmuring to each other in their own language a couple of times, but it didn’t seem overly friendly. After their restrained banter in her office, she had expected… inside jokes, helpful hands lingering on exposed skin, flirty-slash-smoldering looks now and then. The complete lack of comradery was an interesting puzzle the first day, but in time it became as annoying as the silence. 

The pixie stomped its foot on her shoulder, sighed audibly, kissed her quickly on the cheek and then flew off. She wished she knew what it had been saying, and why they all seemed less pissed at her by the end of their tirade and more amused and pleased with her existence overall. Charlie could have explained it to her, could have been teaching her to speak Fae, or keeping her from going out of her mind with boredom, or ensuring that she didn’t destroy anything as they slugged through from one arbitrary spot to the other, had she been paying attention to Dawn at all. 

It really did feel like they were going in circles, honestly. 

Dawn tripped over something and landed on her knees, she looked up and saw Bass leaning down to whisper something in Charlie’s ear, both with their backs to her. Dawn brushed her muddy hands off on her jeans and stayed where she was, on her knees in the grass. 

She was so _over_ this silent-treatment, bizarre passive aggressive tantrum, she really was. This was ridiculous. She might as well just go home. Why did she come anyway?

Something about the diplomatic implications of being friends with a princess, maybe. Or her perverse curiosity that was seriously going to kill her someday, or get her into a really sticky mess… which it has… damnit someone at HQ was going to owe Faith a large amount of money. She wasn’t sure what the stakes were, exactly, but if there was a bet in the Slayer world as to whether or not Dawn would willingly go on a dangerous mission and come back pretending like it was just a research holiday, odds are Faith was behind it and was going to win. 

It took them a few minutes to realize that she wasn’t stumbling along behind them, which seemed odd, since even she could tell that she was causing quite a racket. Even more strange was the look of fear and brightening smile of relief on Charlie’s face when she came out from behind a tree and found Dawn still kneeling in the muddy grass, arms crossed against her chest, and a sullen expression on her face. 

“Are you injured?!” Charlie flew to Dawn’s side, relief and worry crossing over her face in equal measure. “Why didn’t you call out to us? I was so worried.”

Dawn pushed away from her and stood up, brushing the dried dirt off of her knees, “I wasn’t injured. I’m tired. And frustrated. And have no idea what the hell is going on. And look—“ she glared up at Charlie, “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you that I was the Key when you first walked into my office, but I kinda have a history of being hunted by hellgods and their lackeys, so _excuse me_ if I don’t put it on my business card!”

Charlie stepped back, wrinkling her nose, “You don’t have a business card.”

“I think it was a figure of speech, highness,” Bass’ voice came from somewhere above them. 

Dawn glanced up into the canopy and then back to Charlie, “I’m sorry, okay? Can the whole silent treatment thing stop now?” She felt about the same way she had when she was twelve and asked Buffy for a truce in a war they had started over a cereal prize and had slowly gotten way out of control. It was ridiculous, and probably her fault, but damnit if she wasn’t going to be the bigger person. 

If there was one thing she was good at, it was figuring out the perfect moment to be the bigger person to give her the exact amount of leverage for any future conflicts. 

Who said doing the right thing didn’t have its perks?

Charlie shook her head slightly, “Silent treatment?”

Bass came flying out of the trees, landing at Charlie’s feet with a soft thump, “You’ve been doing that stoic silent thing again. I’ve warned you about that before, haven’t I?” He looked up at Dawn, comfortable in his half-crouch low to the ground, “She can go weeks just communicating with her eyebrows if you let her.”

Charlie kicked him in the side, “And _he_ won’t stop making annoying sarcastic comments unless he’s unconscious.” 

Dawn stared at them for a moment, Bass giggling as he rubbed his now-bruised ribcage and Charlie smirking down at him, and came to a startling conclusion. Either they were totally bangin’ while she was asleep or (and this seemed more likely) they didn’t even realize that they were flirting, which was honestly the most annoying possibility. 

“Can I just be let in on the plan? Is there a plan? Are you absolutely certain that we aren’t just wandering around in circles because it _feels_ like we are wandering…” Charlie and Bass exchanged a glance and Dawn flopped back down on the ground, heedless of the mud or the potential pixie hollow her butt was going to be covered in, “We are wandering in circles.”

“We…” Charlie glanced at Bass again, who was still laughing silently to himself, “Had a bit of a disagreement over where exactly we should start.”

“So we started out for Mount Doom, decided to head back to Rivendell, and then turned back for Mount Doom and actually went in a fucking circle?” Dawn hissed. She wasn’t even sure if she was mad anymore. Was it even worth it to be mad? “And you didn’t tell me that this was happening because…”

“Because!” Charlie sat down primly on a fallen log, “Because you are like…” she gestured vaguely at Dawn, “a powerful, immortal Key-thing? And I didn’t want you to know that we… have no idea what we’re doing…”

Bass snorted, “We know what we are doing. Something stupid. _You_ are doing something stupid.”

Dawn rubbed her forehead with one hand, “Have the two of you ever done something like this before?”

“This? Trying to follow the cryptic advice of my manipulative mother to find a place that I was absolutely certain last week was just a story to scare children with? This is a new thing,” Charlie sounded about as tired as Dawn felt. 

“No, I mean like… working together.”

Bass pursed his lips, “Well there was that crusade a while back, or a dozen.”

“War? You two have fought in wars together?”

“We’ve started wars together,” Bass smiled wolfishly at her. 

“We’ve _ended_ wars together,” Charlie countered. “Nearly as often.”

Dawn had a headache. She needed coffee. Badly. She seriously considered kicking a nearby tree and asking the offended nymph for some coffee, damn the consequences. “But have you ever like, solved a mystery together? Sherlock and Holmes style?”

Bass perked up, “Doyle! We met him!”

“You kidnapped him, caused an international event, and I found the two of you drunk in an alley somewhere. Took nearly a month and a lot of bribery to convince him not to write about the whole thing,” Charlie railed, her voice going a little squeaky at the end. 

Bass pointed at her and then at Dawn, “You know, _she’s_ the reason why that Joan kid thought God was talking to her.”

Dawn gaped at him.

“Yeah well, _he’s_ the one that killed that Dimitri that time...”

“You found another one! It all worked out!” Bass objected.

“Enough!” Dawn shouted. “Okay, so we have established that between the two of you, human history has had to deal with a lot of shit. But can we cycle back to the problem at hand? Please tell me that you helped the Illuminati find a kidnapped princess or were there when Arthur found the Grail like give me something, some treasure hunt that you had a hand in.”

“We’ve…” Charlie faltered. 

“She,” Bass pointed again, looking downright pleased with himself, “prefers violence.” He paused, but before Charlie could protest, he continued, “And that’s why the King makes sure I have her back. No one does violence like I do violence.”

Dawn rolled her eyes, “Okay. So no previous treasure hunting experience. Why don’t we start actually _communicating_ with the person who has made research their life’s work? What exactly is the plan? Where are we going?”

“To Nora,” Charlie said firmly. “That’s where we’re going.”

“It’s a bad idea, princess. I’ve …” Bass threw up his hands in disgust.

“Okay, who is Nora?” Dawn said slowly. Really, it was like trying to herd cats getting the two of them to focus. 

“She’s a water sorceress. Very powerful, very knowledgeable. I went to her for instructions when this all started.”

“And now you want to go back?” Dawn considered, “Seems reasonable. Bass? What are your concerns? And please don’t just say ‘stupid’ because that’s not a reason not to do something at this point.”

“He can’t go with us,” Charlie jumped in. “Women-only kind of club… er… well like, region. Fae and human men are not allowed without a direct invite. And Bass… ran out of those a few thousand years ago.”

Bass smirked, “Also the last time you went down to see Nora, she drugged you and kept you there for months. I don’t mind you wanting to get laid, princess,” (except that it totally seemed like this ws the particular part of the plan that bothered him the most). “but I think Miles might kill me if you are gone for that long… _again_.” He looked up at Dawn, almost apologetically, “I’m not entirely sure what Nora puts in her little concoction, but I doubt it will do your human immune system any favors.”

“Okay, so Nora sounds like an epically bad idea,” Dawn said slowly. “What’s our other option?”

“Go back to Court, touch base with Miles, see if there’s not another clue Rachel left behind to figure this all out,” Bass looked frustrated just saying it. Okay, so that wasn’t a good plan, either. 

Charlie was chewing on her lip distractedly. It was worrying. Dawn really needed little miss warrior princess to not be bleeding from self-harm and frustration. She shook her head, “We’re missing something. We jumped into this too fast.” She looked between the two Fae and held back a sigh. Damn she was so tired. “We should have… looked through my books before we set off or something. We walked in blind.” Charlie nodded, her eyes fixed on a rock a little ways away from her. Bass didn’t move or show any signs that he had heard her. “Wait. Why _did_ we come here so quickly?” Charlie looked up, confusion clear on her face, but she didn’t say anything. “We signed the contract, you were _very_ surprised to learn that I was the Key, and then we opened my office door and stepped into Fae. But you said that it took you a while to get to me…” Dawn straightened, “How long were you in the human realm before you walked into my office?”

Bass leaned back on his arms and considered, “Took us about three weeks. These things are never very precise.”

“Then… how did we just, pop back into Fae by walking out my office door?”

Charlie glared at her, “We thought it was you.”

“Me?!”

Charlie shrugged, “The Key.”

Dawn shook her head, “As far as I know, the Key is totally benign. Without the right mumbo-jumbo or ceremony, lots and lots of ceremony, the Key … nothing weird has happened with the Key since Glory had her hands on it except the weird thing when I signed the contract and oh my god.” Dawn stood up, put her hands on her hips, and craned her head back to look at the tree above her. “I’m going to climb that tree.”

Bass huffed out a little laugh.”

“Why are you going to climb the tree?” Charlie said very slowly. 

“How do you know that we are in Fae?” Dawn countered. They both stared at her. “That’s what I thought.” She pointed up. “I’m climbing that tree.”

Charlie coughed, “When’s the last time you climbed a tree?”

Dawn hoisted herself up onto a branch and looked down, “When I wasn’t Real.”

Charlie had a brief, hushed argument with Bass before joining her in the branches. She caught up about as quickly as Dawn might’ve guessed she would, but kept pace with her without acting too much like she was waiting for Dawn to slip and kill herself. Which… okay so was Dawn, honestly. 

“What are you expecting to find at the top of this tree?” Charlie asked after a few minutes of climbing, momentarily distracting Dawn from her vertigo. 

“I don’t expect to _find_ anything. I do hope that we will _see_ something.”

“And what are you expecting to _see_?”

Dawn tried very, very hard not to take offense at the tone that Charlie was giving her. It reminded her of the way Anya explained to anyone who listened how the stock market worked, as if everyone in existence was a five-year old for not caring about what she was an expert at. “What are you expecting to see, princess? If we are in Fae—“

“We _are_ ,” Charlie muttered through gritted teeth.

“Okay. So we are. So what is the first thing that we will see when we get to the top of this tree? Other than more trees?”

Charlie didn’t hesitate, “A valley, with a river running through it down to a harbor.”

“According to?”

She rolled her eyes, but responded, “According to the wind, to the grass, to the stars in the sky at night. According to everything that I know about… _shit_.” At that moment, they broke through the canopy and found themselves looking out at an impossible expanse of green. Trees and trees expanding out as far as the eye could see. 

Dawn whistled, “Is there _anyplace_ in Fae like this?”

Charlie shook her head, silent and wide-eyed. 

Dawn looked down at the ground and smiled grimly to herself. “Do you have any … like… healing properties?”

Charlie’s eyes were still fixed on the horizon, trying to make sense of what she was seeing. “What?”

“If I get seriously injured, would you be able to fix me?”

“Depends upon the injury,” Charlie murmured. After a pause, she looked at Dawn with narrowed eyes, “Wait. Why do you ask?”

“Because I have another theory, and if I’m wrong I’m going to be very, very hurt. So I really hope I’m right.”

Charlie’s eyes flashed gold, “Dawn?”

But Dawn had already flung herself off the tree and was plummeting down towards the fast-approaching forest floor. This was probably the most monumentally stupid idea she had ever had, and once she had spread buttercream frosting on anchovies pizza. That had worked out alright, so she just had to hold onto hope that this would, too.


	3. gravity is rather comforting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dawn has a long chat and comes to a decision

Floating, as a concept, is not a completely horrific experience. It was, at this moment, utterly new and utterly surprising, and more than anything else left Dawn completely at the mercy of her surroundings, which was her real source of discomfort. Also she couldn’t see anything. Or feel anything. It was really just conjecture that she was floating.

Wait.

Nope. She could definitely move her arms and legs.

Floating.

In pitch darkness.

Perfect.

“See, this is why you don’t go on suicide missions with emotionally compromised princesses and their serial killer boyfriends,” Dawn muttered to herself. Floating was _not_ as comfortable as she thought it would be.

Somewhere, a woman chuckled and that just pissed her off. “I think your companions would object to being described thusly.”

Dawn formed her face into a scowl, “Yeah well, they got me into this mess so I can pretty much say whatever I want.”

“And if they can hear you?”

Dawn considered, “Then they’d probably both focus on the personal attacks and ignore the fact that I implied they are banging. Which they are. Or they should be. Maybe.”

The voice chuckled again, “And how do you think they would describe you?”

“Well,” Dawn wrinkled her nose. “They’ve only known me for a few days, so probably in rather vague terms that have something to do with being batshit crazy. Not that I can blame them.” Dawn felt a sudden warmth ease through her and around her, which she took as a good sign. “Hey um… where am I anyway?”

“You. Are in the Between.”

“Well that’s good, that’s where they wanted to go.”

“But _they_ are not here,” the voice chided gently.

“Shit. Right. I was hoping they’d just be swept along with me. Didn’t really think this plan through.”

“You tempted me, at great risk to yourself, why?” the voice sounded genuinely curious.

“Why did you – whoever you are – take us to a place that _seemed_ to be Fae, but wasn’t? What was the point?”

“Key—“

“No,” Dawn interrupted, “Hey. Please. It’s _Dawn_ , okay? My name is Dawn. I’m human. Or that’s what they tell me anyway. Things are starting to get a little muddled again.”

“Alright then, _Dawn_ ,” the voice sounded amused again. Dawn tried to take that as a good sign. “You and your companions have been in the Between since the moment that you combined your blood with that of Fae royalty.”

“So… the Key, or like my blood, it _isn’t_ benign like we thought? Because Willow… she’s a friend… she’s been doing a _lot_ of magicky things and I’ve been doing tons of research since the whole Glory fiasco but, we thought the Key was no more.”

“Do you really think the Universe would allow something as Powerful as the Key to stop Being?”

“No. I had _hoped_. I don’t really like being kidnapped and bled dry.”

The voice snorted in a rather unladylike manner, “Glorificus was foolish. She used your Power in its basest and most dangerous manner. The monks who created you …”

“Did a rush job?” Dawn cut in, curious. “I’ve always felt it was a rather rushed job.”

“In a manner of speaking, yes. They did not put the proper safeguards in place. Death should _never_ have been the price of the Key.”

Dawn tried not to cry at that, “Shoulds and shouldn’ts don’t go very far when your sister has already died for you.”

“No,” the voice was very gentle now, “I’m very sorry for that.”

Dawn sniffed, “Can we fix that?”

“I do not have the power to do so. You are a vessel with flaws. That is how you are made and that is how you must stay…” The voice paused, and when it began speaking again, there was a bit of humor lingering in it, “May I suggest a bodyguard? Or at least… caution you against following every pretty girl that asks for your help?”

Dawn blushed, “How could I say no to a princess?”

“Yes, I believe that is what her mother was counting on.”

Dawn folded her arms across her chest, “Okay so I’m in the Between. Who the hell are you?”

The voice laughed, a twinkling sort of sound that filled the air and made Dawn’s fingers tingle, “Priscilla.”

“Fantastic. Great use of the cryptic, one-word answer.”

“I am Rachel’s sister. Of sorts. I am more and less than her, just as she is more and less than me.”

“You just said the same thing twice,” Dawn grumbled.

“We… complete each other. In a rather disastrous way.”

“You are the Seer Charlie needed to find?”

“Yes.”

Dawn’s mind started to spin, “But if this was all just about a family meet-and-greet, why didn’t Rachel bring Charlie here herself? Is she here with you?”

Priscilla’s voice turned grim, “Rachel is currently curled up in bed with her King, safe and sound in the Fae Court.”

Dawn couldn’t help it, she started laughing. Laughed so hard she thought her face would split and she’d have that pain in her side for the rest of her life, “Oh man. Bass is going to be so _pissed_ ”

“Indeed,” Priscilla said shortly. “As am I, quite frankly.”

“What did you mean when you said that you complete Rachel in a disastrous way?”

Dawn could feel Priscilla hesitating; it affected the air around her, tightening in a strange and disconcerting way. “There is always a predecessor for everything, except for me. There is always a beginning and an end to everything, except for me. And her. She has always Been, but she has not always been Queen. I, on the other hand, have always been the Guardian for this place. Just as the Key has always been what it is, but you have not.”

“So…” Dawn struggled with the convoluted metaphor. “So… you are _part_ of Rachel? You are the Key to Rachel’s… me?”

“In the most simplistic sense, yes.”

“Do you have a body or are you just, the Between itself?”

Priscilla laughed again, warming Dawn’s toes, “I am only its guardian. It is even older than I.”

“How can something be older than a person that has always Been?” Dawn rolled her eyes. Really, she was starting to talk like the Seer, that wasn’t a good sign.

“Time does not move in one direction, and the Fae realm is as old as it is. As old as Time. And yet there are realms and dimensions older than the Time of Fae.”

“Ooookay,” Dawn drew out. “So since you … _became_ … you have been here?”

“I have been the guardian. I chose to stay here only very recently.” Priscilla paused, “Recent for _me_ , anyway. For my sister it has been a very long time.”

“So you are here as a guardian. And Rachel lives in the Fae and is the Queen, but isn’t the first Queen? But you are the first guardian?” Dawn felt like she was trying to unravel a bit of Willow’s tech code or one of Andrew’s cryptic emails detailing the gossip back at HQ without using anyone’s names or any specifics. “And you are sisters and grew up together?”

“Yes.”

“So… why did Rachel send Charlie to see you?”

“That… is something only Charlie can get an answer to.”

“So then, why didn’t you bring her straight here? Why the days wandering around a false Fae? Why bring me here alone?”

“Because there is a question that only _you_ can receive an answer to, just as Charlie has an answer waiting for her, so do you. And first, you needed to find your way here on your own.”

Dawn blinked against the blackness around her and was filled with a sudden and swift burst of anxiety. This was like, the worst day ever. And now she had to figure out what an immortal Seer needed to tell her, by figuring out a question that she didn’t know, in a place where she couldn’t even see her own hand when it was right in front of her face. Yeah, this was going splendidly. She was _definitely_ going to survive.

Priscilla chuckled, “You know the question, don’t overthink it.”

“Can you only answer one question?”

“Clearly not.”

Dawn winced, “How will I know when I’ve asked the right one, the reason why you wanted me to come here?”

“I did not want you to come, the Key _needed_ to come.”

“In order for me to ask the right question.”

Priscilla hummed in assent.

“Why… did the Key need to come?” Dawn screwed her eyes shut and hoped that it would be that easy. She didn’t really feel like playing twenty questions while floating in the dark. Or at least… not for very much longer anyway. Priscilla made no sound and offered no answer, so that was probably the wrong question. How annoying it must be to be the person who always answers everyone’s question and knows everything and has to wait for someone to… oh snap! “So…” Dawn started, trying to keep the note of amusement out of her voice. “There’s this movie or like this _story_ in the human realm of a boy who finds a magic lamp and inside is a genie who will grant him any wish. In some versions, there’s a limit and that makes it a little more emotional, but sometimes there’s an unlimited amount. It doesn’t really matter. The boy makes all these wishes and he gets the girl of his dreams and there’s a villain, because there has to be a villain, but at the end,” Dawn swallowed nervously, “at the end, the boy makes a final wish: that the genie would go free and never have to grant another wish that he didn’t want to grant.” The silence felt heavy, as if something was pushing her down. Dawn had never before been so delighted to feel the effects of gravity. “So I just wonder… what is it that _you_ want to ask, if you were given the chance?”

Dawn was blinded by a sudden flash of light. After who the hell knew in complete sensory deprivation, the onslaught of sudden light, colors, smells, and textures, made her feel nauseous and weak. “Ouch!” she protested, falling gently into something squishy.

“Here,” Priscilla’s voice – no longer disembodied and all-encompassing – hovered somewhere above her head, and something ceramic and warm was pressed into her hand. “Coffee.”

Dawn blinked slowly, “Coffee?!”

Priscilla laughed softly and moved away, settling herself down in a beanbag chair across from Dawn. Dawn sipped the coffee and looked around curiously. They were under a cloth canopy in the middle of the forest, surrounded by beanbag chairs, small tables, a small fire, a couple of bookshelves, and various other items that one would typically find in an office or private library. She smiled over the edge of her mug, “You’re kind of an asshole, aren’t you?”

Priscilla, a small woman with dark hair, small, slanted eyes, a wide nose, and a small pointed chin, wearing a simple white linen top that hung loosely on her thin frame and a pair of black skinny jeans but no shoes, smiled charmingly and shrugged, “I am just the Guardian. Sometimes the Between has… a personality all its own. That I can’t control.”

“A personality that likes mind games and fuckery?”

Priscilla’s smile widened, “Something like that.”

“So I asked the right question?” Dawn looked around a little disconcertedly. “Has anyone else… I mean… am I the first person…?”

“You are the first moment in all of Time and Before Time that the Key has had a human vessel, a conscious vessel with beautifully human free will. Which means that, yes, you are the first creature to enter the Between and ask what you can do for it rather than the reverse.”

“The Between…”

Priscilla raised her eyebrows slightly, “Is… the place where people come when they desire to know their fate. This is the place Between worlds, where everything is possible and nothing is unwritten.”

“And as the spokesperson, you deal out people’s Fate?”

“When they ask me to,” Priscilla nodded. “It is a rather thankless job, I can tell you.”

“Do they always ask you to… to tell them their Fate?”

Priscilla looked out into the trees, tapping a soft beat against her leg with her long fingers, “They come here by mistake or by chance or because of a quest, stumbling through my home seeking _something_ , seeking answers. And I am bound … I _was_ bound, to tell them one answer. Always one answer.” She looked back at Dawn, “It is rarely the answer they want to hear.”

“I bet not,” Dawn laughed.

“The Between draws in the hopeful and the hopeless, the lost, the seeking. Anyone can find their way here if they are truly seeking answers.”

“And they never asked the right question?”

“I suspect…” Priscilla hesitated. “I saw that you would be created, flawed, so terribly and gorgeously flawed, and I _suspected_ , but could not see and therefore hoped, that the Key, the only living Power source that can travel to any space and place, open any door, reveal any of a thousand Fates, could unlock this place, this Between, and …”

“Are you telling me that I just killed Fate with a Disney movie?” Dawn burst out, immediately clamping a hand over her mouth in shock.

Priscilla shook her head, “Think, Dawn. Really and truly _think_ very hard.”

Dawn looked down at the coffee in her hand and a sudden weight fell on her shoulders, “No.” She looked up at Priscilla, “Please, _please_ no.”

Priscilla’s eyes softened, “I am eternal, I will always be here as long as I am needed.”

Dawn drew in a shaking breath, “I don’t want this.”

“And because of who and what you are, you can walk away if that is what you so choose, of course. I could not before and now I _will not_ , until you are ready.”

A single tear dripped down Dawn’s face, “I am ready for my question.” She struggled to breathe, to form the words, “Are there still answers here, still hard and steady answers? Or did I take those away?”

Priscilla cocked her head to one side as if listening to something Dawn could not yet hear, “There are answers, but they can be changed. Why don’t you ask first?”

“The monks… they made me human, an innocent. But they didn’t make me mortal, did they?” her voice was infinitesimally small, as if she wished the words had never exited her body.

“You can be killed, if the Key is misused, as Glorificus attempted to do. It was a selfish and stupid oversight on the part of those silly monks. They wanted the choice to destroy the Key, even if doing so would change the fabric of the entire Universe.” Priscilla’s voice hardened as she spoke of the monks and she immediately tried to apologize, “I’m very sorry for their error. They did not think ahead.”

“They did. They wanted the Key gone, even if it was their job to protect it.”

“Yes. It was foolish and short-sighted of them.”

“So… it’s true. I’m immortal, barring a ceremony and a tower and a blood-letting.”

Priscilla inclined her head, “There are other ways for you to die, if you were to choose.”

Dawn shook her head, holding up her hand to stop the other woman from speaking, “Let’s cross that bridge when we come to it.”

“You have…” Priscilla paused, curious and surprised in equal measure. “You have already decided what you want to do.”

Dawn smiled broadly, “Yeah… for now. Like. Immediate future plans. I do.”

A breeze swept through the trees and Priscilla smiled back, “What a delightfully wicked thing.”

“And fun,” Dawn said, standing up. “And ridiculous and silly and … a once-in-a-lifetime chance, really.”

Priscilla stood also, holding out her hand, “Enjoy yourself, then. And I shall see you soon.”

Dawn took her hand and then fell back into a mud puddle. “Shit!” she muttered, looking around at the surrounding forest. Priscilla was nowhere in sight, but a small pixie flew up and poked Dawn in the nose, giggling merrily when she grinned back at it.

“Are you injured?!” Charlie flew to Dawn’s side suddenly, relief and worry crossing over her face in equal measure. “Why didn’t you call out to us? I was so worried.”

A slight shimmer passed through the air, without Charlie noticing, and Dawn knew that they were firmly back in the Fae and ready to begin their journey in earnest.

Dawn laughed, “I’m not hurt, just tripped _again_.” She grabbed Charlie’s arm and allowed herself to be hauled back onto her feet. “But I had an idea… do you have that parchment with your mom’s note on it?”

Charlie produced the note immediately and Dawn slipped the small silver blade out of her jacket sleeve, slicing a small cut on her palm, and rubbing the blood over the parchment. Instantly, bright green lettering appeared, almost glowing.

“Bass!” Charlie crowed excitedly, “Dawn has saved us!”

Bass appeared at her side and looked down at the words glowing and flickering on the page, “Well I’ll be damned,” he smiled. “Now we can actually get started.”

Charlie beamed at Dawn, “Are you ready?”

Dawn slung her arm around the girl’s waist and gestured ahead, “Show us the way, oh fearless leader.”

 

 

_Find the knight at the troll bridge. Challenge him to a duel._   
_Take the knight’s sword to the dwarves in the mines to the North._   
_Seek passage through the mines._   
_Attend a wedding at the heart of the mountain.  
(You may have to help her work up the courage to propose.)  
Give her the gem from the knight’s sword as a wedding gift._   
_Take the river out of the mines and to the valley._   
_Find the missing goose, take the goose girl’s token and a goose feather._   
_Help an old woman in the next village._   
_Give a young man the goose girl’s token._   
_Find the windmill, help the engineer repair it._   
_Dance at his son’s birth day celebration, talk to the woman with the red hair, give her the feather._   
_Take the red-haired woman's boat to the island with the crows._   
_Dig under the third tree, spill the Key and find the Between._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had no intention of this world/story getting so large. I probably *won't* write the entire quest, but I *hope* to give this series Charlie/Bass' POV - probably extending back pre-quest and continuing post-quest. Basically I want to give ya'll the "Charloe getting together" fic that this series desperately is lacking. So you know, if you want that, yell at me and I'll probably do it.


End file.
